Call for Papers

Important Dates

Full Paper & Panel Submission: 28 December 2011 (11:59pm PST)
Doctoral Consortium Submission: 24 January 2012  (11:59pm PST)
Research and Experimental game Festival Submission:19 January 2012  (11:59pm PST)
Research and Experimental Game Festival Notification: 01 March 2012  (11:59pm PST)
Paper, Panel & Doctoral Consortium Author Notification: 01 March 2012  (11:59pm PST)
Posters and Demo Submission: 12 March 2012  (11:59pm PST)
Poster and Demo Notification: 25 March 2012  (11:59pm PST)
Camera Ready Full Papers and Research/Experimental Games: 27 March 2012  (11:59pm PST)
Camera Ready Posters and Demos: 29 March 2012  (11:59pm PST)

FDG 2012, the International Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games, is a focal point for academic efforts in all areas of research and education involving games, game technologies, gameplay, and game design. The goal of the conference is the advancement of the study of digital games, including new game technologies, capabilities, designs, applications, educational uses, and modes of play.

We invite researchers and educators to submit to FDG 2012 and share insights and cutting-edge research related to game technologies and their use. FDG 2012 will include presentations of peer-reviewed papers, invited talks by high-profile industry and academic leaders, panels, and posters. The conference will also host a technical demo session, a Research and Experimental Games Festival, and a Doctoral Consortium. The technical demo session will include novel tools, techniques, and systems created for games. The Research and Experimental Games Festival will showcase the latest experimental and research games. The Doctoral Consortium serves as a forum for Ph.D. students to present their dissertation research, exchange experiences with peers, discuss ideas for future research and receive feedback from established games researchers and the wider FDG community.

Submission type:

• Full Papers with a maximum length of 8 pages
• Posters with a maximum length of 2-page abstract
• Doctoral Consortium with a maximum of 3 pages extended abstract
• Demo with a maximum length of 2-page abstract
• Workshops with a maximum length of 2-page abstract
• Panel with a maximum length of 2-page abstract
• Research and Experimental Game with a maximum length of 4-page abstract

Submission Tracks:

Authors should submit to either general conference or to one of the following tracks:

• Game Studies (studying games, players, and their role in society and culture)
• Game Design (methods, techniques, studies)
• Serious Games (building and evaluating games for a purpose; learning in games)
• Games Education (preparing students to design and develop games)
• Artificial Intelligence (agents, motion and camera planning, navigation, adaptivity, dialog)
• Game development (tools, frameworks, networking, databases)
• Graphics and Interaction (rendering, modeling, animation, understanding players and interfaces, interaction techniques)
• Panels (all areas)

All submissions will be rigorously blind peer-reviewed for their scholarly merit, significance, novelty, clarity and relevance to the advancement of the study and creation of digital games. All full papers must describe a completed unit of work and show rigorous and compelling evaluation of the ideas they present. Posters should describe novel work in progress that is not at the same level of research maturity as a full submission. In addition, a number of workshops will be held within FDG 2012, focusing on emerging areas. Please refer to the FDG website for the respective calls for papers. 

Papers and Panel Submissions

Papers must not exceed eight pages and panel and poster submissions must not exceed two pages. Panel submissions should describe the focus of the panel, provide a list of confirmed speakers, and indicate their areas of expertise relative to the topic. Submissions must not have been published previously. In addition, a submission identical or substantially similar in content (in its entirety or in part) to one submitted to FDG should not be simultaneously under consideration at another conference or journal during the entire FDG review process (from the submission deadline until notifications of decisions are emailed to authors). Authors of an accepted paper that focuses on an experimental or prototype game will also be invited to demo the game on which their paper is based in the Research Games Festival.

Technical Demo Submissions

FDG 2012 will include an interactive technical demo event to showcase the latest tools, techniques, and systems created for games by academic or industrial research groups. Playable games should be submitted to the Research and Experimental Games Festival.

Doctoral Consoritum Submissions

FDG 2012 invites PhD students to apply to the Doctoral Consortium, a forum to provide PhD students with early feedback on their research directions, from fellow students, researchers, and experienced faculty in the area. The consortium is intended primarily for PhD students who intend to pursue a career in academia, who will soon propose, or have recently proposed, their research. To apply, doctoral students should submit a CV, a 3-page extended abstract describing their proposed research, and a support letter from their PhD advisor. The abstract should address the goals of your research, the proposed approach and how it differs from prior work, any results you may have, and your plans for completing the work. Invited Doctoral Consortium students will give a 15 minute presentation and present a poster at the conference. Accepted DC abstracts will appear in the conference proceedings. For more info, see the Call for DC papers. 

Research and Experimental Games Festival Submissions

The Festival is designed to showcase playable games that are experimental or have a research component. Submitted games could be significant because they are designed to answer a research question or experiment with the design process, or because their technological components represent research advancements. Works in progress are permitted, but the game will ideally include at least one playable level (or comparable unit of play time). Works that have not yet reached this stage may be more suitable for the conference demo track. In addition to submitting the game, submissions should also include a 2-4 page writeup of the project which addresses technical as well as other requirements needed for demonstrating the game at FDG. The text should outline the game’s research context, and how the work demonstrates rigor in methodology and a contribution to knowledge. Submissions should also include a link to the game hosted on your own server or one of your choosing. We welcome and encourage works exploring a variety of disciplinary approaches and methodologies, including interdisciplinary collaborations. It is the responsibility of the contributor to ensure all necessary information is accessible at all times during the judging period (19 January 2012 to  01 March 2012).

General Submission Guidelines

All submissions must be in either PDF or DOC format, and comply with the official ACM proceedings format using one of the templates provided at http://www.acm.org/sigs/pubs/proceed/template.html. We welcome videos accompanying submissions to demonstrate the contribution when necessary. 
For videos, we require that all videos be in MPEG 4 encoding using the H.264 codec, 50 MB or less in size, and 5 or less minutes in length.

Submissions must be made via EasyChair at https://www.easychair.org/conferences/?conf=fdg2012

All accepted submissions will be published in the conference proceedings. For accepted submissions to appear in the proceedings, at least one author must register for the conference by the deadline for camera-ready copy submission.

***Pending final approval, all publications from FDG 2012 will be included in the ACM Digital Library.***

If you have any questions or problems, please do not hestitate to contact the conference chair at magy @ neu dot edu or program chairs at mconsalvo @ gmail. com and feiner @ cs. columbia. edu.